![]() | Feature: Physical Education
in Early Childhood | No.51 September 2007 |
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Physical activity plays a central role in children’s development and
learning. Look at almost any infant, in almost any setting, and you will
see plenty of evidence of this; through activity children learn about their
bodies, their physical and social environments, they try out different roles
and rules, they test themselves. Indeed, it might be said, as it once was
by the great psychologist Jerome Bruner, that movement, action and play
make up the ‘culture of childhood’.
This much, I think, would be accepted by most physical educationalists
and sports scientists. It is also a frequent claim of NGOs and other organisations
that promote child health and child physical activity. Many of these groups
stress the vital importance of introducing children to physical activity
from an early age. This makes a lot of sense as there is mounting evidence
that healthy attitudes and behaviours are best developed when young. It
is strange, then, that early years physical activity continues to receive
relatively little attention from scholars. From the large number of empirical
and theoretical academic papers that are published within the broad field
of sport science, only a small minority relate at all to the early years.
This Bulletin, which was co-edited with Alexander Woll, endeavours to
address this shortcoming, albeit in an exploratory and tentative manner.
The papers included in this edition report on a range of exciting initiatives
and studies. They are also, implicitly, an invitation to join in with
this fascinating area of inquiry. I hope you find these papers stimulating
and provocative, and that this Bulletin generates new ideas and conversations
about early years physical activity and physical education.
Contact
Prof. Dr. Richard Bailey
Froebel College Roehampton University London, UK Email: r.bailey@roehampton.ac.uk ![]() http://www.icsspe.org/portal/index.php?w=1&z=5 |